Prince Harry landed back in the UK tonight and appeared to confirm he had killed during his tour of duty, and added that he was 'longing' to catch up with William and Kate 'behind closed doors' in a reunion to which the media 'aren't invited'.

His loathing of the press was obvious when he openly scoffed at a reporter who asked him whether the impending birth had caused him to 'reflect on his own destiny' by bumping him down the order of succession.

During a five minute interview at RAF Brize Norton he also gave a far more diplomatic answer when asked if he had 'killed Taliban' on duty, saying he was just doing his job. There was no repetition of the crass comments made in a BBC documentary earlier this week which was filmed in Afghanistan when he compared warfare to computer games. and twice said he operated around the principle, "Take a life to save a life."

After landing at the RAF base in Oxfordshire, he was told that headlines had quoted him saying he killed Taliban insurgents and was asked: "Is that what happened?"

You can say that again, pal!

The artist who painted the much-mocked first official portrait of Kate Middleton has defended his work, saying that one of the reasons it has received so much abuse is because it doesn't photograph well.

Paul Emsley told Hello magazine: "At first the attacks were so vicious that there was a point where I myself doubted that the portrait of the Duchess was any good. But now I've had time to reflect, I am still happy with it and am getting on with my life. There is nothing I would have changed…I believe half the problem is the portrait doesn't photograph well and I would encourage people to go and see it [at the National Portrait Gallery]."

The Royalist discusses Harry's ill-advised musings on the similarities between war and Playstation.

A perceptible hardening of attitudes against Prince Harry following his ill-advised remarks yesterday in which he compared modern warfare to a computer game.

Harry Mount in the usually blithely patriotic Telegraph is  the pick of the bunch. In a terse and cogent piece of writing he argues that 'the loose-tongued Spencer emotion will, sometimes, have to give way to the stiff Windsor upper lip."

He accuses Harry of the crime indiscretion: "Never in her 86 years has the Queen been a fraction as indiscreet as Prince Harry was in his interview to mark the end of his tour of duty in Helmand Province this week… once the TV cameras turn up, it’s time to stop the officers’ mess banter, and draw a veil over the bloody facts of military life…"
Mount also criticises Harry's immaturity: "He is still young – only 28 – and the roistering Prince Hal days can, in theory, go on for ever: succession disasters notwithstanding, he will never become King Henry IX. But it’ll soon be time to put away childish things. What now looks like hot blood and instinctive reactions will be petulant oafishness in 10 years’ time."

The left-wing, republican Guardian surprises with a piece drawing somewhat favourable comparisons between Harry and former fighting Kings and princes.

Prince Harry is in Cyprus where he has been given the regulation four cans of lager and has a 24-36 hour "decompression" period after completing his tour of duty in Afghanistan.

The Prince arrived late last night, according to local paper the Famagusta Gazette.

The U.K. Ministry of Defense revealed last night that the 28-year-old prince had completed a five-month deployment in Afghanistan, where he served as an Apache helicopter pilot with the Army Air Corps.

The British base at Akrotiri is the halfway point between RAF Brize Norton in the UK and Camp Bastion and used for troops returning from combat to adjust to normal life.

Prince Harry has been accused of demeaning himself by comparing his role in the Afghan war to playing Xbox by Taliban commanders.

The Taliban leaders, who were speaking to a reporter from the Daily Telegraph from an undisclosed location, were angered by the way Prince Harry described his role as co-pilot of an Apache helicopter, in charge of its weapons systems as being like playing a computer game.

“It’s a joy for me because I’m one of those people who loves playing PlayStation and Xbox, so with my thumbs I like to think I’m probably quite useful,” he said in an interview broadcast on the BBC last night.

The Telegraph says that the Prince's typically unguarded comments "could prove a headache for President Hamid Karzai, who has staked his reputation on working closely with Nato-led forces and wants the US to station troops in Afghanistan beyond the end of 2014."

The Telegraph spoke to Zabihullah Mujahid, a Taliban spokesman, who said Prince Harry was a “coward” for speaking only after he was out of harm’s way.

From The Telegraph:

“This statement is not even worth condemning. It is worse than that,” he said by telephone from an undisclosed location.

“To describe the war in Afghanistan as a game demeans anyone – especially a prince, who is supposed to be made of better things.”

He added that it exposed the calibre of forces that Nato was able deploy.

“It shows the lack of understanding, of knowledge,” he said. “It shows they are unfamiliar with the situation and shows why they are losing.”

A commander in Helmand, where Prince Harry was based, said soldiers from dozens of countries were fighting in Afghanistan. To describe their efforts – and deaths – as part of a game was to show a lack of respect, he said.

“It’s not a game. It’s very, very real,” he said.

Prince Harry has confirmed that he did fire on and kill insurgents in Afghanistan, twice saying he had to "take a life to save a life" in an interview with the BBC.

Harry went on to compare warfare to a video game, leading a Taliban commander to brand him a 'coward' who had 'demeaned' himself with the comments and didn't understand the nature of the war in Afghanistan.  The 28-year-old Prince’s remarks, which have been met with a combination of jingoistic approval and shocked dismay by observers today, were made to journalists in Afghanistan but were not broadcast until last night after he had left the country for a 'decompression' stop in Cyprus where he will be given four cans of lager.

The interview came after a four-month tour of duty flying Apache helicopters, with news media agreeing not to publish Captain Wales’s comments until today, now he has left the country, under the terms of a media agreement.

The Royalist reported at Christmas that Pippa's publishers had passed on the opportunity to publish another book by the "Turkeys-are-perfect-for-feeding-larger-gatherings" author, and the Mail has a big page lead on the story today.

It goes into some detail with a friend of Pippa telling the paper that Kate's sister feels like 'a caged animal' due to the restrictions placed on her by her connections to the royals.

The friend says: "Pippa left a good job as Event Manager at party planning business Table Talk to focus on launching her writing career. She was counting on [the book] working. She is becoming increasingly frustrated and angry that her reputation and livelihood is being affected by the constraints of royal life - especially as she is not a royal herself. In truth, she has had enough of it. She’s not a member of the royal family and is completely fed-up with having nearly every aspect of her life controlled just because her sister happened to marry into the royal family. She feels trapped like a caged animal and it really is getting her down."

The Royalist has heard that Pippa's publishers at Penguin have found working with the royals a nightmare experience that none of them are anxious to repeat. Pippa, meanwhile, is stuck in limbo with the terrifying prospect of becoming the next Fergie looming ever closer.

The Royalist has previously reported on how Kate and William's popularity has boosted the Royal family's financial affairs, and now new figures published in New York show that their allure in America has significantly swollen the coffers of their international charities.

For the Daily Telegraph reports that a polo match in which William played and Kate attended (William's team, won and Kate kissed him when presenting the trophy) in California generated revenues of $2.5 million (£1.63 million).

The figures are contained in year end accounts for, "The American Friends of the Foundation of Prince William and Prince Harry".

The Telegraph says: Players paid more than £60,000 each to take part with the Duke in the match, which was played at the Santa Barbara Polo and Racquet Club in California. Six hundred guests, including the Hollywood actors Billy Zane and Jennifer Love Hewitt, paid up to £2,500 each for lunch.

A St James’s Palace spokesman hails the polo event as “extremely successful”, adding: “Its costs were covered entirely by corporate sponsorship, enabling the net proceeds of $1.4 million (£915,000) to go directly to the American Friends of the Foundation, which is delighted to have had a very successful first full year of operation.

“It is already helping to fund projects to support servicemen and women leaving the Army, and injured soldiers overcoming their physical and psychological challenges.”

Kate Middleton - a coffee lover who previously was known to ask for an extra shot in her Java - has switched to decaf in the interests of her unborn child.

Kate was spotted in the Kensington branch of Starbucks recently ordering a decaf latte plus cookie, while her minder waited outside holding her dog. She paid with her Starbucks card.

It used to be thought that drinking coffee during pregnancy could contribute to ADHD - a potential problem for a monarch - but recent studies show that drinking moderate amounts of coffee during  pregnancy may not be as bad for you as had been thought. A recent  study suggests that women who take in less than 300 mgs of caffeine per day - about the same amount of caffeine as a grande latte with an extra shot, but a Dabnish study in 2003  found that women who drank more than eight daily cups of coffee during pregnancy increased their risk of miscarriage or stillbirth by as much as 300%.

The media company behind the Kate Middleton hoax call has caused new controversy after one of its radio presenters called British chef Marco Pierre White a "rude p***k".

White later said Austereo, "lacked sensitivity and regard for others".

International Business Times reports that a Melbourne-based radio presenter quizzed the chef about his three failed marriages, saying: "Hey mate, married three times, was the first wives dismissed, for want of a better word, cause they can't cook, or didn't like your cooking? Is that an issue with them?"

In response, the chef said he was just pleased that he had found three women who were willing to marry him.

Note to potential royal gift givers: William and Kate don’t need any more woven palm floor mats. On their trip last year to Tuvalu, they were given no less than eight of the items by enthusiastic locals wanting to present their royal highnesses with a gift.

The information comes from a list published today of all the gifts that William and Kate received on their official overseas tours in 2012. As well as the numerous woven palm floor mats, they also received several woven fans of the type Kate was often seen cooling herself with on tour, a pair of bamboo flutes for a fan in the Solomon Islands, a bottle of chilli sauce from a Malaysian well-wisher, a twin set of South Sea pearls from the wife of the Prime Minister of Malaysia and six pairs of shoes from the Queen of Malaysia.

And, while the rest of us are sometimes guilty of sneaking out of a hotel with a bathrobe we ‘accidentally’ packed in our case, such mistakes are not necessary for Will and Kate who can now pad around their home in their very own set of matching bathrobes, a gift from Raffles hotel in Singapore.

Princesses Beatrice and Eugenie swept into Germany today for their mini-adventure - a two-day tour of the country promoting the UK.

The well-dressed pair buzzed around the trendy German city in a Union jack-branded Mini on the first day of a tour which has been funded privately by their father, Prince Andrew, and is widely perceived as an attempt by the Yorks to fightback against Prince Charles efforts to cut them out of the royal picture.

The Goring hotel in Kensington, which sprung to fame when it was occupied by the Middleton clan before the Royal Wedding, has been awarded a royal warrant by the Queen.

The family-owned London hotel was the focus of the world's media when Kate Middleton stepped from its doors on her way to marry Prince William.

The Goring Hotel has been awarded a "Royal Warrant of appointment to HM The Queen for Hospitality Services", the hotel said in a statement this week.

Seems like the nude pictures really did his pulling power no harm: Prince Harry has been crowned Town & Country magazine's top bachelor in the world, beating out 39 other handsome, wealthy, and perpetually single men for the top spot.

The magazine describes the list, which features 40 fabulous gents, as "a highly subjective, thoroughly opinionated survey of the princes, politicians, scions, DJs, and billionaires-to-be we consider the most eligible men in the universe."

It credits Harry’s skills when it comes to both flirting and flying for his desirability, saying: "Prince William's baby brother flirts and flies Apache helicopters with equal aplomb."It says he likes "Bardot blondes; polo ponies and goofing off" and describes his 'natural habitat as either Mayfair nightclubs or "the caves of Tora Bora".

The list also features Jack Nicholson, Charlie Rose, George Hamilton Patrick Schwarzenegger and his cousin Conor Kennedy.